


Father Knows Best

by Dunaven



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Bad Love, Fucked-up shit occurs, M/M, Masochist Dean, Poor fathering, Repressed Jimmy, Sweet kid Sam, Teen Dean, not an hea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-01-08
Packaged: 2021-03-12 05:54:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 32
Words: 20,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28505532
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dunaven/pseuds/Dunaven
Summary: Since Mary died, John has put hunting ahead of everything, including his boys.When Dean goes missing, will John's skills be enough to help him save his son?
Comments: 7
Kudos: 15





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Pineslover123 approached me with this story idea and it was dark enough, I figured I’d try my hand at ghost writing. If you dig the story, you’ve got her to thank.

The windshield wipers on John Winchester’s ’67 impala are scraping double time, on the highest setting, battering away the rain. Still not fast enough to make the black road visible through this brutal downpour. All John can see is the white dividing lines.

The storm was behind him when he left. But it must be traveling faster than his 85 MPH. When the freeze hits, this is going to be a bitch, to paraphrase the weatherman.

Luckily, Highway 87 between Pullman, Minnesota, and the shack outside of Winslow is clear except for John’s car and this storm. 

He wipes a fist beneath his good eye - tears slipping free due to full-body agony, although frustration surely adds to the cause. John’s other eye, the left, is a swollen, clouded, mound of purple flesh over a tortured orb. Scraped cornea. If he’d conferred with an ophthalmologist, they’d tell him he was lucky he hadn’t lost it and recommend surgery. John’s plan is to patch the thing like a fucking pirate and let it heal in its own time.

Wounds always heal, eventually. The physical kind do, if they don’t become infected. But John is expert at Civil War medicine - drinking and pouring a shitload of alcohol over most injuries, crooked stitching, as necessary, and letting the good Lord Almighty do the rest.

His whole face is puffed up like one of those fish. His limbs are loose in the sockets, like a strong wind could rattle his bones into a heap. His hands buzz, nearly numb from the shooting and slinging the machete. From the blows thrown and blocked. And the ones he was too slow to block.

He passes an exit sign for Odom. Could have pulled over and slept in the car there. Funds are too short for a motel). Or he could keep following the State Route and stop in on Kate, watch Adam sleep for a few minutes. Maybe get laid. Hold her a little. Talk some.

But not in this condition. That woman still thinks John is a government contractor (hence the travel). And not in this wintry mess.

It’s only another three hour’s drive. Better to push through. The rain evolves: fat drops of slush become daggers of ice, dinging noisily on the roof of the car. At this rate, John could wake up snowed in somewhere tomorrow. He’s been gone from the boys a week, and although Dean knows how to handle himself, he’d only left them with enough cash for a day. 

That had been all the cash in John’s pocket. And he hadn’t expected to be gone this long. A routine Rugaru hunt shouldn’t have taken this long. Shouldn’t have ended this way. John hasn’t even called in the results to Bobby yet.

Still keeps going over it like a quarterback on Monday morning, torturing himself with solo motion replays of that one bad pass. Cursing his miscalculations more than the receiver’s butterfingers. 

John hadn’t had a receiver. He’d gone this one alone like he usually does. And everything was according to plan, according to training. He’d entered the warehouse, found the vic bound and bitten, but not yet turned. It’s hard to pinpoint where things went to shit. 

The bottom line is, even when John managed to bring down the monster, it doesn’t count as a win if the victim doesn’t survive. It’s a god damn shame is what it is. More tears. Because of the pain. Even the busted eye leaks. 

The boys have trained long enough. Dean’s been shooting since he was 4. Next hunt, that boy is coming out with John. None of this stuff about Sam’s too young to be left alone. John needs back up. Two men on a job is always better than one. That’s all there is to it. 

Yeah, the monster’s down. So is that poor, little girl from Winslow, rest her forsaken soul. John had salted and burned her separately from the Rugaru, buried the bones in an unmarked grave. He would have left the body for the parents, but there was no guarantee, since she’d been bitten, that she wouldn’t resurrect and turn. Then, John would be back half a year later, hunting the same shit again. He couldn’t save her, but he could save her future victims. It’ll be Bobby’s misfortune to have to make up a plausible story and report the mess to the local cops. 

It’ll be up to some sheriff or deputy to deliver the news to the parents. John doesn’t envy any of the cogs in this fucked up machine. He’s only part of it to vindicate Mary. Once he finishes the fucker that killed her, he’s out. Out for good. 

Then what? Construction? Mechanic? Security? He doesn’t have to worry about that now. All he has to do is drive.

A coughs and his mouth floods with that familiar warm copper and salt cocktail. He spits a pint of blood into a fast-food cup and dumps it out the window into the blizzard. All he’s got to do is keep his right eye open and his right foot on the gas. Then, he’ll be home. If you can call it that.

  
***

The impala’s tires slip over the inch of ice on the gravel road leading to the Winchester’s current hovel. The place ought to be condemned, with its slanted kitchen floor, the missing planks on the porch, the illegal space heaters that barely warm each room, and the plastic film insulation over the single-paned windows. That’s how Winchesters make the place liveable this winter. Even then, John can still see his breath inside the shack. 

But it’s free. And there’s a roof under which to shake off the snow that fell on his shoulders as he dragged his battered body from the car. The moment the door closes behind him, John is face to face with his younger son. Looks like Sam has grown an inch in the week John’s been away. 

He’s standing in the middle of the floor with a meat cleaver. It lowers, but not quickly enough.  
  
John looks around and doesn’t have to ask, “Where’s your brother?”

No response. Dean isn’t supposed to leave Sam alone, ever, for anything. He knows that. He’s only 15, but he’s allowed to drive their piece-of-shit truck to get them both to school. He’s to wait around in town until Sam’s school lets out and drive back to the cabin. Otherwise, they salt the entrances and hunker down. These are the rules, but it’s no wonder Dean gets restless.  
  
John was a kid once, with the whiff of some tail too good not to chase.   
  
Still, rules are rules and John Winchester does not tolerate disobedience, not even for nature’s call.   
  
“Where is he?”  
  
Sam’s a good little brother and he’s no rat. Lips clamps shut. And you know what? John is too tired and too damaged to push.   
  
Wherever the hell Dean is, good for him. Hope he’s enjoying it. He’s getting snowed in with his pussy. When he gets back, John is going to tan his hide. That boy is going to do so many pushups, his arms will turn to pudding. 

“I’m going to bed,” John grumbles.

“Aren’t you gonna—”

He growls, trods into his room, and shuts the door. Whatever Sam wants can wait.

“Dad?” The door muffles the kid's voice and John is intent on ignoring him. “Can I come in?”

John doesn’t say no. He doesn’t take off his boots. He kneels on his bed and then collapses, face-first on his pillow.

The door squeaks open and Sam whispers, “It’s been two days.”

John hears the words but they don’t register with meaning. All he processes is more of Sam’s infernal whining. That kid is always whimpering about something. His grades, or the food, or his achy bones. 

“Fuck off, Sam.”

The flash of remorse is quickly overridden by a wave of exhaustion that sweeps John to the verge of sleep. 

“Dad, please?”

How much easier would his life be if it weren’t for these kids? Would Mary still be alive? After all, she was protecting Sam…

That thought always costs John a pang of regret - for the sentiment, for the kids, forever getting married, for being born. 

Sleep will burn that off the depression. John sniffs, an inadvertent whiff of his own blood and the monster’s, still on his clothes.

Wherever Dean is, he’s fine. God is a capricious bastard, but he wouldn’t be so cruel as to let something bad happen to John’s oldest son. Then again, God was sure rough on his own boy.

Sam is still in the room, silent when John slips under. 

Once he enters REM, Mary meets him, as she often does. In a white sundress, brown cowgirl boots, and a wide-brimmed sun hat over her cornsilk curls. God damn this woman is a looker. John grins, all cleaned up in a crisp white shirt and a jade bolo. Jeans ironed and his Stetson in his hand. No pain.

They approach each other over fields of knee-high grass and wildflowers, under a wide-open sky and too-bright sun. On rough nights, some black cloud or a forest fire or a faceless beast will rush up behind her and no matter how John screams or runs, there’s nothing he can do to save her. All he can do is watch her be swallowed whole and wake up cursing the cold sweat and the shivering.

But tonight is a good one. She’s saying something, but he can’t make out the words. Oh, but he can see Mary’s half-cocked grin. She never pulls the trigger on a full smile until he’s close enough to kiss it.   
  
Moving slow, swaying those hips like a goddess. Finally, John reaches for her shoulders to pull her in. He can feel her - solid in his hands. It’s going to be a good dream, folks.  
  
Her expression changes, eyes faltering, and glassy as if she’ll cry.

“Jesus, no. Mary, what?”

Her pain pains John. Her child birthing damn near killed him.

“You were supposed to take care of them, Johnny.”

“Fuck you, Mary. I’m doing my best.”

John turns away from her in shame for the profanity he’d have never dreamed of raising against her in real life.

Can’t do this - justify his choices. Hunting ain’t pretty, but it’s kept them all alive. If it had been up to John, he’d have died in that fucking fire alongside his life’s great love.

If John didn’t have this pain and vengeance to offset the vacuum left by his shattered heart, he’d have crawled into a bottle long ago and pickled himself from the inside out. Sure, he drinks, but he sobers up, too.

These boys are lucky their daddy’s got a demon to kill. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be any good to anybody. 


	2. Chapter 2

An hour later, Sam stands at the door, gnawing his thumbnail down to the flesh.   
  
“Dad?”  
  
It’s a whisper his father wouldn’t hear even if he were awake. Carefully, Sam turns the knob and toes his way into the room. Another ten minutes passed as he snail-creeps across the squeaky floor. Finally, he reaches his destination and stares at the expanse of his father’s back, barely visible in the darkness.  
  
“Dad?”   
  
Sam doesn’t even hear his own voice that time. He sits on the foot of John’s bed beside the muddy boots, breathing in the musty stink of blood. Moving on to the nail of his index finger.  
  
This is his fault, actually, if you look at it. He didn’t have to tell Dean he was hungry. Should have shut up about it. But after 48 hours of nothing but coffee, his stomach had spoken up loud enough for both of them.   
  
“Fuck this,” Dean had said grabbing his coat from the back of the chair and pointing in Sam’s face. “You do not fucking leave this cabin, got it?”  
  
Of course, Sam knew the deal, including the part that Dean was not to leave him alone. But it was far from the first time. 

Not the first time Dean had left him alone. Not the first time their food had run out or that their dad had stayed away longer than he’d predicted. It is, however, the first time Dean had done this.   
  
Dean always comes back. Sometimes in the middle of the night, and in a bad mood. Or a particularly good mood. Occasionally drunk, but never not at all.   
  
Sam’s father is the strongest, bravest man in the world. He fights monsters. Real monsters.   
He doesn’t think much of Sam, because Sam thinks all the fighting is awful. And his father knows that. Sam never said it and he does the training stuff, mostly without complaining. But he hates the idea of killing anything.   
  
The weird thing is that Dean idolizes the old man, but still has space in his heart for Sam. Makes fun of him sometimes, sure. Catches him in a headlock daily. Administers the requisite noogie. Hasn’t been able to help Sam with his homework in years, but he’s a good brother.

Not like Sam has anyone to compare him, too. He just knows. 

In addition to noogies, a good brother hugs, listen, and never lies to you. He also makes sure you’re fed. When you move to the next new town, a good brother is the only person you can talk to, because he knows exactly why your shoes pinch the heck out of your baby toe until you get this weird kind of blister on there. 

Then, he’ll give you one of his two pairs of his shoes and help you stuff them with toilet paper until they fit pretty good. 

Or he might explain to you that sex ed is not gross, and girls are not scary and even if they are, it’s just like monsters. Acting like you’re not horrified is the secret to defeating them. 

Monsters.  
Not girls.  
You don’t have to defeat girls, but sometimes you have to be lab partners with them or something and that makes Sam want to turn into water and trickle away.   
  
But Dean told him to act like girls are boys. It’s weird, but when Sam does that, it’s okay talking to them. As long as he doesn’t get one with boobs. When that happens, he freezes up trying not to look at her shirt - even if there’s something cool like a butterfly on it, because he doesn’t want her to think he’s one of those boys who…   
  
John groans in his sleep and rolls away from Sam’s perch. 

Sam sighs. This place is only slightly crappier than the last place. That was an apartment in Wisconsin. Their dad left them alone there all the time. Dean would pace the floor, he’d open the cabinets, swear and eventually go out.   
Then, after a while - and this is the important part - he’d come back. With milk and hamburger meat and peanut butter and stuff. Rarely would he bring any vegetables, but by that point, Sam was happy to have anything.   
  
No. This is weird and very unDeanlike behavior. Plus (and Sam doesn’t talk about this - not even to Dean. He never has and never will) sometimes, he gets feelings. Mostly bad ones. 

When someone is going to bother him at school, or the car’s going to get a flat tire, he can almost always tell it’s coming.

This is worse. It’s the worst bad feeling he’s ever had. Bad enough to make him sneak into his father’s room and listen to the old man’s snoring.   
  
But not quite enough to convince Sam to wake his father up.   
  
  
***

Dean is hanging from a cross. That’s what they call it, although it’s more like an X. He knows nothing of St. Andrew.  
All he knows at this moment is agony.

His wrists and ankles are cuffed, not nailed. He wears no crown of thorns. He faces no jeering crowd. Only one pair of clear, blue eyes gaze up at him with religious awe.

“You’re so fucking beautiful. But you already know that. Don’t you?”


	3. Chapter 3

As usual, Bobby Singer wakes before dawn. The man is tougher than leather, but he’s got a God damn little girl’s walnut-sized bladder. Always has. 

And once he’s up, his capacity for sleep gives up the ol’ ghost. It’s always been this way. No use grumbling about it, but he does anyway. Grumbles and gripes all the way from his bed to the can, down the steps to his kitchen, and the whole time his brew is percolating. It’s not until he tips in a couple of ounces of Jack and lets the concoction slide smooth down his crotchety old throat that he releases a hiss, feeling more like an American man than a lizard.   
  
  
***  


Wounds are always worse on the second day. These injuries are no exception. John rolls onto his back, every cell thrumming like warmed-over shit on the short end of a stick. 

Waking up today was a mistake.   
  
He shuffles from the bedroom like the undead bastards he puts down. The bright-as-hell sunlight floods into the open window, taxing his one halfway decent eye. The storm has passed over but only after dumping a foot of snow.  
  
John shakes his head. “Would you look at this shit?”  
  
No reply. 

Sam is at the kitchen drawing, scribbling. That feverish scratch of a pencil against paper gives John another reason to wince. He picks up one of the papers:  
  
Have You Seen Me?   
In middle school block letters.   
  
Beneath the question, a damn decent likeness of Dean. Alike enough to recognize the boy. This is the first John has seen of Sam’s artistic talent. His fatherly instinct tells him to shut it down. Hunter wisdom reminds him that being able to draw can be helpful in keeping archives. John’s own journal is full of sketches and runes, symbols, and such.   
  
But one thing he can’t encourage is this dramatic obsession with his brother. It’s not new. Sam has always been a clingy, little snot-nose kid. Dean tolerates Sam climbing in his lap, into his bed. Dean respectfully reminds John that the boy’s got no mother. At this rate, he won't have much in the way of balls neither.  
  
John drops Sam’s poster back onto the heap of them. More than twenty, each meticulously worded and drawn and filled in with Bobby’s number at the bottom.   
  
“Why Bobby?”  
  
“‘Cause we… you know,” Sam still stutters sometimes and it drives John absofucking nuts. “What if we’re not here? Bobby’s always there. I don’t think he ever leaves his house.”  
  
It’s good logic. The Winchesters never let the rubber cool on their tires before they’re moving on to the next town. The longest John can remember staying anywhere was the six-month stint in Wabash County. And that was for… reasons.   
  
Still, he can’t stop the twinge of annoyance at Sam’s … everything. 

There isn’t a thing about this boy that doesn’t needle its way under his skin and make him want to scratch off a layer to get rid of it. The soft, apologetic tone of voice, the way he follows Dean around like a neutered shadow, even Sam’s god damn preternatural intelligence drives John batty.   
  
“You think we’re going to leave here without Dean?” he asks. “You really think this is necessary?”  
  
Little drama queen. And for once, Dean isn’t here to protect Sammy from the wrath of Dad. John’s got a mind to tell his faggy younger son just what he thinks of him, but first, he’s got to do something about the distinct taste that somebody shat in his mouth overnight.   
  
John brews his mojo twice as strong as the average bear. The first gulp he swishes around his sore cheeks, gurgles, and spews into the sink. He gets another solid look out of the kitchen window. Won’t be any school today. Won’t be going anywhere.  
  
Sam shakes out his right hand, probably sore from the writing and drawing marathon. 

“He’s fine,” John says. “Holed up somewhere with some female.”  
  
Probably good looking, too. Ladies like Dean as much as they ever liked John and he’s not even fully grown yet. Few inches short of six feet, but with broadening shoulders and Mary’s fresh-faced, fair good looks. Confident kid. Charming. Winchester genes.  
  
Sam could grow into his, but it’s not likely. He’s cute enough, but plumpening his way through puberty, covered in pimples and destined for nerdity. Surprisingly strong. He does all right with training, but he slides right out of his skin when a human being says, “Hello.”

Has Mary’s eyes, though. The shape, not the color.  
  
John holds the mug in his left hand. The knuckles on the right feel like they were tromped on, because they were. Might be a dislocated metacarpal in there. He’ll know once the swelling recedes.  
  
If they’re going to be stuck indoors until the snow melts, might as well make good use of the time. But all he can do is stare at Sam. If it was Dean, John might suggest a game of cards or something. If John felt less like Death, he’d offer to wrestle or spar or something.   
  
Sam doesn’t wait for a recommendation. He stands, stacks his papers neatly, and carries them to the door. He sets them on the arm of the sofa to pull on his jacket.  
  
“What are you doing?”  
  
“Going to go into town and post these around.”

John chuckles because it’s ridiculous. The kids won’t make it to the main road. Town is out of the question. Furthermore, it’s all a waste of-   
  
The phone rings.  
John limps over - knee stiffening now. No surprise. The fucker did kick him right in the patella. It’s a wonder he can walk.  
  
“‘Lo.”

“John? You back?”

John doesn’t waste breath responding to a question Bobby’s already answered for himself. The man is miles from dumb, but he doesn’t act it.

“And Dean?”

“What about him?” John asks.

“Is he back, too?”

This time John doesn’t reply because the question shocks his system like electricity.

“He isn’t, is he?”

“No.”

“Well, balls.”

John’s brain is too busy scrambling to catch up to be concerned with Bobby’s choice of expletives. 

“He’s been gone, what, three days now?” Bobby asks. “Sam still there?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, small favors. This ain’t like Dean. He wouldn’t just up and disappear on Sam like this. Something’s going on.”

That surge is snaking its way through John’s veins - fast, now and hot.   
Teenage Johnny have would’ve abandoned a newborn baby for a chance to sniff around some girl’s panties. But Dean isn’t like that.

“John?”

“What?”

“What do you think it is?”

“You think it’s a what?” That snake in John’s system sprouts spikes.

He’s taught Dean well. The boy can fend for himself, but nobody knows better that there are some nasty creatures out there that don’t take prisoners and don’t give a fuck about your feelings.

“Well, what else would it be?” Bobby asks.

John runs his bad hand through his hair. 

It hurts, but pain is the only certain part of life. Misplacing your kid isn’t supposed to be. Sam has stopped by the door in his coat, posters hanging from his hand, watching the conversation between his father and Bobby. For all the perfect test scores and letters from impressed teachers, the kid was going in the snow in his sneakers.   
Some genius.

“We’re snowed all the way the fuck in, Bobby.”

“Yeah, it’s a mess here, too.”

But that doesn’t matter. Neither does John’s pain or Sam’s shoes. Twenty minutes later, John Winchester and his spare son are slogging up through snow - thigh high on the elder, drifts up to the smaller one’s belly at times. 

It’s slow, brutal going. The storm is over, but the winds have picked up. Trees whipping back and forth. John’s face catching fire from the icy gale. Despite the ferocious weather, Sam doesn’t complain.   
Not once. 


	4. Chapter 4

Kate Milligan barks out an ugly cough as she slides open the curtain and peers out of her bedroom window. It’s a few minutes before sunrise.   
Snow fell, but just an inch or so. The worst of it blew right by. 

She casts a half-smile on the warm, tiny angel who’d climbed in and commandeered most of her bed last night. Adam is spread out like a letter X , his flannel-clad hiney nowhere near the absorbant pad Kate uses for these occasions. It’s damn lucky she didn’t wake up in a puddle of pee. Her boy is a cherub, but bladder control is not yet his forte.  
  
After she showers and dresses, Kate runs to the tiny kitchen and fills the kettle for her herbal tea. The stuff smells horrible, but the lady at the natural foods store swears it works. It’s pricey, like the rest of their organic junk, but Kate had to do something. Her chest has been killing her and what single parent has time or money for a clinic?

She coughs into her fist, half-expecting blood. At least it hasn’t come to that. But she spits a thick wad of neon-green mucus into a paper towel. 

“Wonderful.”

Adam is finally over the kiddie version of this bug. Two months ago, when Kate called John, sincerely worried for their son, he came right away. He’s been here every few weekends. Even bought the antibiotics. The last thing Kate wants is to push her luck with John’s generosity. And what if he thought she was faking to make him come around more?

It’s always an eggshell two-step with him. 

The tea smells funky, too, and it’s too hot to drink. So, Kate wakes the little one, which is never a small task. Adam is an early-morning grumbler. He’ll still be groggy and grumpy when they arrive at his overpriced pre-school. 

He sleeps through socks and pants. Keeps his eyes shut tight while Kate pulls on his shirt and combs his hair. She leaves him in the bed and goes to smear his toast with butter and raspberry jam. 

“Wake up, baby, come on,” she breathes the words onto his warmy neck. 

He doesn’t smell brand new anymore, but still fresh. A 45-pound limp noodle in her arms. This would be so much easier if John were here. Not every day, but more often.

If Kate allows herself to slip down the rabbit hole of wishing, she’ll be crying before work, and she’ll wreck her make up, and be late, and Brad is already so so patient and understanding. Not right to take advantage of her boss’ kindness, and his glaringly obvious attraction, even despite Kate’s fugly CVS uniform. 

With a painful deep breath, she straps her son into his high chair. The last time John was here, he suggested putting Adam sit in a big boy seat. Kate hadn’t argued. She never does, no matter what she thinks of his opinion. It’s always such a relief to see his car by the curb, to have his big, hot hand on her back, the rumble of his voice in a room. She doesn’t dare do anything that might curtail his trip. Or make him not come back.

John has been good lately. Around more. Especially when they urgently need him. Kate would never wish her little boy sick, but John came through. She nods to herself and begins finger-feeding Adam the first triangle of toast. John had been against that, too. 

“He’s four, Katie. Why on earth are you feeding him like a little baby?”

Because Adam is what she has. He’s everything.

Kate loves John more than she wants to think about. But John is … wherever he is right now. 

The day Kate began showing, her evangelical mom put her out of the house and hasn’t talked to her since. Her useless drunk of a dad doesn’t give a shit one way or the other. Luckily, Brad had known someone from his church - every connection is through the church in Windom - who was looking for a responsible person to look after their mother’s house after moving her into elder care. More sheer luck that the place hasn’t sold yet. Kate dreams of buying it, but that’ll never happen on a CVS salary. 

Maybe with John’s income, too, but she hasn’t got the guts to ask what he earns, let alone whether he ever intends to settle down. With her. Here or anywhere.

It wasn’t just Kate’s mom who was pissed off at Katherine Milligan for getting herself knocked up out of wedlock. Kate wasn’t too impressed with herself either, but John Winchester was (attention: cliche alert) not like other men. As if Kate had any prior experience on which to base that judgment. 

But he’s not. John is special. He’s handsome, strong, gentle, attentive, amazing. He’s just not here right now. 

So, it’s up to Kate to get her boy ready for the day. Her decision whether to finger-feed him or not. She does for the next couple of bites. Then, she recalls that Brad offered to help with her taxes after work today. Says he can help her get a refund, which would be incredible. And if she turns them in early the money comes early. She’s doubtful, but if it actually happens, she’ll kiss him - on the cheek, of course.

Not that he’s ugly. He’s nice-looking, in a Windom way. Younger than John and already a store manager. He’s also probably never traveled farther than Minneapolis. Besides, she’s not going to… 

would never do that to John. Even though Brad’s income must be enough to afford a house. 

Kate’s mind is splitting itself into two directions as she wanders back into her bedroom to collect the papers she’d gathered for their tax session.

By the time she returns to the kitchen, the entire lower half of Adam’s face is red. Her heart lurches for a moment before she realizes that it’s raspberry and not blood. Then, she sees the broad stain across the second-hand skateboard dinosaur on his shirt.

“Come on, Adam.”

He looks up, pale eyes wide, frown beginning to waver. He’s sucked his anteater tongue in from trying to lick away all the evidence. Now, he’s on the verge of tears.

“No. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…”

Too late. The siren lets loose an ear-splitting howl. Worse than the noise? If she doesn’t leave in two minutes, they’re late. Adam is late to pre-school. Kate is late to work. The alternative? Send her son to school with jam in his hair. 

So far as she knows, she’s the only single mother at his preschool. She might be the only one in Windom. She sure as hell is not going to send her son to school looking like a homeless urchin. That’s her mother’s word, and it was never pronounced with compassion. 

“Look at that little urchin with the holes in his pants. Does anyone even care about him?”

Mornings would be so much easier if John was here. Everything would be. Kate wouldn’t feel like a slut. She wouldn’t be so fucking lonely all the time. He wouldn’t have to marry her, and you know what? It doesn’t have to be John. It could be damn near any man with gainful employment.

It’d be so easy to walk into a bar with a low-cut shirt.   
Well, not that. 

She could go back to church and rope a good guy. Tell God and Jesus and everyone that she repents her sinful ways and that Adam is a blessing. He’s still young enough to say Daddy to someone other than John.

But she’ll never do it. Not as long as his real father comes back once or twice a year.  
  
God. 

Boys used to chase Kate. When did she become this desperate, clingy mess?

Once or twice a year, for a few days at a time. Is John Winchester that amazing? He is. 

And he’s done better since Adam’s rheumatic fever, he’s been around every few months and it’s been wonderful. Kate ought to be grateful to have a man like John. Even if she has to share him with the road.

Handsome, strong, gentle, attentive, clever, but not over-smart. It feels like Heaven in his arms. Safe and secure from all alarm.   
Is it blasphemy to quote a hymn?

If Kate would stop being a chicken and enroll in those night classes, eventually, someday, she won’t have to depend on John or anyone else. 

Yeah, right. And if she thinks somebody is going to let the girl who flunked biology become a nurse she’s even dumber than her 2.2 high school GPA proves.

Adam’s wailing is like an alarm clock when you’ve had two hours of sleep and there’s a 16 hour day of work ahead of you. Kate has no difficulty understanding how some people hit their children. Her mama sure spanked her plenty in her day, but only for sassing and sin. Never for crying. 

John Winchester’s son has jam everywhere. A change of shirt won’t do it. This calls for a full bath, which Adam gets - along with a healthy dose of groaning from his mama before she hacks out another cough - clutching her chest as if that will ease the pain.


	5. Chapter 5

Of course, John doesn’t complain either. He doesn’t even grumble under his breath despite the throbbing in his bones and jackhammer behind his eyes.   
Under the bitter, grey-white sky, he grinds his teeth, lifts his knees damn near to his chest, and forces himself through each step. 

The left eye feels crusted over, but there’s nothing to see besides snow - broad drifts of white whipped about by the harsh wind. Trees with their limbs blanketed, icicles hanging dagger-like from the tips of every bough. If they were warm inside with hot cocoa and a fireplace, it’d be a beautiful scene. 

Always impressive, the silence of snow. There’s not a sound except their sloshing feet and labored breath.

Has John brought his younger son into the frozen wilderness to die?

The cabin is an unpaved mile from the tiny two-lane road that leads another two miles to the main thoroughfare. Those first three miles are a Hellish march except the burn is from impending frostbite. 

They could have waited for a thaw, but the moment a bug gets under John’s skin, he’s got to move. All it took was that tone in Bobby’s voice. That urgency and doubt. Coupled with Sam’s pile of goddam drawings, he’d have lost his mind staying in the cabin another minute. 

What John still can’t do is entertain all the possibilities of where Dean might be. He’s got to be with some girl. In which case, John is going to slap the shit out of his cum-led head. 

He grits his teeth and shoves down the other alternatives: the ones with yellow eyes and claws and an appetite for boy blood. So many options on that list: demon, vampire, werewolf, skinwalker. Something that grabbed him for a snack. Or a vengeful motherfucker punishing John for a decimated nest. John has feared a beast’s vendetta from the first time he slaughtered one.   
  
The groan slips from between John’s teeth. Sam glances over, still silently accepting the wicked-cold death march. His pants must be sopping wet and freezing to his skin, just like John’s are. Winchesters don’t have decent winter clothes. Generally, they migrate south like birds and old folks, but John had dragged the boys up here because Kate called, frantic.

Now this.   
John couldn’t have left Sam at the cabin. This is not a good plan. It’s just the only way.

And the whole fucked up situation makes John wants to break something. Shoot something. His own fault, and yet the heavy force of his anger swells up at his younger son’s wet hair. If they’re out here too long like this, Sam is going to catch whatever the hell Adam had. The worst experience on earth is sick children. 

Looking at their pale faces, suffering, unable to express where it hurts. Begging for you to fix it. Staring down, helpless, with a palm on their burning foreheads. Cursing and imploring a deaf God with the same breath. All of his boys have been the kind of sick that make John want to trade his own soul for them to feel better, but he’s never felt personally responsible for their illness. When this snow march catches up to Sam, it’s going to be John’s fault. 

“Fuck.”

John groans as he stumbles to his knees. Snow freezes the hairs inside his nostrils. He flounders like a shot bear with Sam scrambling uselessly to his side. He’s too small and weak to help. John could lay in the snow and die. It would be the easiest solution. 

After a second of languishing, he forces himself to his block hard, nearly numb feet. 

It takes another forty-five minutes of hiking before they arrive at the main road. It’s a slushy mess but paved. John and Sam climb to the top of the fifteen-foot mountain of filthy ice/snow and wait. 

Not much traffic. The weatherman’s warning to stay home is redundant to the inability to move your car. 

The good news is that the first truck that slipslides along the highway stops, probably out of morbid curiosity. John would sure have hell preferred a station wagon with a lady and a couple of rugrats. Whenever possible, he avoids the trucker breed. A few years back in Tampico, he caught a couple of them looking at his boys like they were porkchops slathered in A-1 sauce. Maybe they aren’t all like that, but John won’t soon forget that gluttonous look.

But he’s in no position to be selective when there’s no telling the next time a vehicle will pass. Ever since they’ve stopped walking both John’s and Sam’s teeth have been audibly chattering. 

He taps Sam’s hunched shoulder.

“Come on.”

His legs are a pair of inanimate sticks somebody shoved into his hip sockets. As they hobble to the truck, John tells his boy to sit by the door and keep his yap shut. 

The guy turns out to be okay. Grady Johnson. Same gruff exterior and kind eyes as Bobby. John breathes deep, grimaces through the ache of pins and needles reminding his heart that it needs to pump blood to toes and fingers, too. 

“Roads a lot clearer out Windom,” Grady says. “Little out of the way, but what the hell. Y’all stay out in this mess much longer, might lose a foot.”

That’s no exaggeration. John rubs his hands together by the vent and tries not to think that Dean could have been out goofing around in the woods. If he fell broke a leg, he might be exposed to the elements.   
The fact is, John doesn’t know where the hell his son is. All he knows is that he’s going to find him.


	6. Chapter 6

At the welcome end of another long, dull day Kate battles another coughing fit before she clocks out, bundles up, and heads for the door. Her shoulders are already hunched in anticipation of the cold. 

She’s never been to Florida, but she dreams about it. She’s never even been as far west and south as Kentucky, but one of these days…  
  
“Katie!”  
  
Brad always calls her that, even though she’s asked him a dozen times to stop. Just because they went to school together for twelve years doesn’t mean Kate has to be reminded of the fact every single day. Then again, she should have known when she let him hire her, despite having no experience in retail, that there would be a sacrifice.  
  
“You don’t need a ride or anything, do you?”  
  
That only happened one time. Her car broke down. A jump didn’t do the trick. It takes physical effort not to roll her eyes. Her lungs and throat feel like they’re on fire and she’d rather not speak.  
  
“No,” Kate rasps and casts a longing glance at the door. “Thank you.”  
  
“No. Yeah. Of course. It’s just… It’s a mess out there.”  
  
There’s a little snow on the ground, but nothing Kate hasn’t been driving in since she got her license a decade ago. She fakes a smile and turns to leave.  
  
“Well, be careful,” Brad says to her back as the chime over the door sounds.  
  
It’s dark out, but the streets are relatively clear. She’s on time to pick up Adam. He didn’t bite or scratch anyone today, so victory there. And other than the trail of snot, he's in good spirits.   
  
That’s great for him because his Mama feels like she could collapse into bed the moment they get into the house.   
  
Of course, that’s not going to happen. She’s got to make his supper, bathe and brush his teeth, read to him. This is not the first time Kate asked herself why she had this kid. It’s also not the first time she hated herself for thinking that.   
  
She piles the wiggling worm into his carseat. Could drive the three miles home in a coma. Arrives and frowns up at the house.   
  
Did she actually leave the lights on?  
It was a rush this morning, but it’s weird.   
  
Kate coughs, rubs her aching chest, already mentally preparing herself another cup of that awful tea. It doesn’t help, but it was too expensive not to drink every last drop.   
  
Of course, Adam has the same superpower as four-year-olds everywhere: he’s able to fall asleep in the car during a ten-minute drive. Whenever her son is sleeping, Kate falls completely in love with him again. Despite the screaming pain in her lungs and her body wanting to fold in on itself, she wrestles his little frame from his seat and carries him to the front door.   
  
Kate’s gloved hand fumbles in her coat pocket until she finds the keys. She shifts the boy onto her hip, removes the glove with her teeth, and opens the door.  
  
The moment it’s closed behind her, she suffers a shock so severe, she nearly drops her son. A man stands from her sofa and she lets out a loud yelp.   
  
Adam jolts awake and starts to cry. Seconds after he’s in John’s arms, Kate’s heart is still beating faster than usual.   
  
“Didn’t mean to scare you,” John says.  
  
Not that he scared her. Okay, he did. Terrified. She’s a young woman who lives alone with a small child. John never asked for a key.  
  
This whole thing isn’t like him. He was here five days ago, checking in.   
Sure, he shows up out of the blue, sometimes, but this is weird. First of all, he looks like hell. Damp hair. Jeans and the KU sweatshirt he keeps in Kate’s bottom drawer. But his face is a mess. The left eye is swollen. His lip is busted. He’s cooing in Adam’s ear like the amazing father he’s always been (when he’s around), but he’s also limping.   
  
Kate coughs into her gloved left fist and gets another surprise.   
  
A boy. 

Much bigger than Adam. Maybe ten. Kate’s not great with guessing kid’s ages. She’s never been good with kids and this one seems odd.   
He’s staring straight ahead at the wall, not looking at any of them. It’d be less strange if there was a piece of art in the place where he’s looking, but there’s nothing but beige paint.   
  
John puts Adam on his feet, helps him out of his coat and mittens, and gives him a soft pat on the shoulder. “Go say hi to your brother.”  
  
Adam looks at the shaggy-haired boy and doesn’t waste a single moment before he toddles over and takes the kid’s lax hand.   
  
“Sam, say hello.”  
  
Sam doesn’t speak or move or even lower his eyes to look at Adam. Kate subdues the instinct to pull her son away.   
  
John has spoken about his boys, but she never expected to meet them. The night they met, John was skunk-drunk and wailing about his poor, dead wife - lost in a fire. He’d been so sloppy and bereft that at first, Kate thought it was a routine. This big, strong gorgeous man crying into his beer. It was too heartbreaking to be true.   
  
But John never changed his story. It only expanded to include Dean and Sam. From the ages, this must be Sam. That would make him eleven. 

John has mentioned that he’s unique. Crazy smart.   
He acts crazy.   
  
“Listen,” John says. “I didn’t want to do this.”  
  
Sam is wearing a pair of her pants and a too-small t-shirt. He’s a tallish kid and it kind of fits him.  
  
“I got to leave him here.”  
  
“What?”  
  
Kate was expecting an explanation of John’s wounds. Or a proper introduction to his son. Not that announcement.  
  
John strokes Adam’s hair once and sniffs at Sam before he turns to Kate again and says, “A day, tops.”  
  
John Winchester is a good man, but if there’s one thing he can’t do, it’s tell time. He’ll make predictions that he’ll return in a few weeks. Months will pass without a word. Kate is used to it, but when he says that Sam will be here a day … well, she’s not a complete idiot.   
  
Adam is still holding the boy’s hand when John reaches for his leather jacket. He always leaves it draped over the back of the armchair. That limp is pretty pronounced. Was he in a bar fight? And is he serious?  
  
Is Kate going to let him walk out of here and leave this weird little boy? Can he even speak? 

When has Kate ever stood up to John or made any demands? Not while his long, strong arms are wrapped around her and she feels, for that few seconds, like everything is worth it. All the nights and days without him are worth this moment.   
  
John reaches into his wallet and pulls out what he calls, “a little bit.”   
It’s a generous term for a twenty-dollar bill, but Kate thanks him with a nod.   
  
“Dad, you need to hurry up.”  
  
John looks back at the strange boy. So, he can speak. That’s a relief, but not much. He’s intense and soft-spoken and something about him scares the absolute shit out of Kate. Adam is still hanging onto two of his fingers.  
  
Anguished passes over John’s face, but if there’s one thing she’s learned about this man it’s that you don’t inquire. He might tell you what’s going on, but more often, you’re left to wonder. 

Is that what makes him so attractive? The mystery? The darkness? The fact that she’s never met anyone like him.   
  
As John is going out of the door, Sam calls after him again. This time, he speaks a bit louder, “Look for blue eyes.”


	7. Chapter 7

Four months ago, their dad was talking about heading down to Dahlonega, GA for the winter. Bobby had sniffed out a few cases in the area. Enough to keep them busy. Dean was still mostly boysitting Sam, but he’d been out on a few hunts with his dad, and was fast becoming the adrenaline junkie his pop had raised him to be.  
  
They’d packed all their gear and everything. Then, their dad got a call and all of a sudden, they were driving north, against plans and common sense, into the shit weather.

Minnesota.   
  
Dean didn’t question his father. Ever.

1) because he knew what the backside of the old man’s hand tasted like.   
2) because the old man knows what the hell he’s doing. 

This was not their first time in Minnesota. In fact, they’d made at least five stops here in the last few years.   
  
Again, Dean never questioned it. Some areas have higher levels of supernatural activity. And his dad definitely hunts. Sometimes, he comes back battered and bruised and barely breathing.   
  
But there are also times when he disappears for days without doing any research or prep. Then, he comes back unscathed.  
  
Dean may not be as bright a bulb as Sam, but he can recognize a pattern. And the smell of perfume. The thought of their dad’s girlfriend caused a little twinge in Dean’s chest on his mom’s behalf, but, also, John Winchester is a man.   
He probably needs that. Dean doesn’t call him on it.   
  
Not even when they arrived in the cabin and their dad left Dean with a twenty-dollar bill and didn’t return for a week.   
  
The second time he pulled that stunt, Dean enrolled Sam in the elementary school. Sixth grade. He had all the necessary paperwork and the story of his father as a migrant worker who reports to his construction site at 5 am. Sam’s puppy dog eyes couple with Dean’s precocious maturity and charm. Works every time.  
  
Then, Sam started whining about food. Sometimes, Dean wanted to smack him. The kid didn’t know how to be hungry, because Dean always scraped half of his food onto his brother’s plate. Dean couldn’t even count the nights he’s gone to sleep with his belly full of coffee, with his arms wrapped around himself, gut growling in dissatisfaction.   
  
Dean only misbehaves bad when the situation is dire. A totally empty fridge qualifies. Literally nothing but yellow mustard and a cracked slice of American cheese. Nothing new. 

Dean has learned to make magic with canned pasta but these are times when his non-culinary skills get tested. At 15, he can already play a mean game of billiards, but most places won’t let him in without his dad. Winchester’ don’t beg or accept Presbyterian charity. That leaves one option.  
  
Without knowing how long they’d be in town, it wasn’t clear how much trouble was safe. For example, if Dean stole a car or broke into a house, it wouldn’t matter if they left the next day. His prints still weren’t on any database. 

Shoplifting is always safer, though. Quick, dirty. In, out. The key to successful five-finger discounting is actually buying something. A pack of gum, for example. 

Wandered down the aisles, perusing sweet marshmallow cereals Sam wouldn’t eat even if Dean could sneak a box out of here in his shirt. After strolling down every aisle, he stuffed a pack of hotdogs down his pants, nestled in cold and wet right next to his junk. He and Sam would have eaten well off those for a few days.   
  
The cashier smiled as he paid for his Bubble Yum. Dean whistled on his way to the automatic doors, hands in his pocket. Cool as a sea cucumber. In retrospect, it was probably his age that gave him away. A teen during school hours is a red flag he should have thought of. But times were desperate.

As he was stepping through the door, a heavy hand landed on his shoulder.


	8. Chapter 8

Sam always had a touch of what Stephen King calls the Shining. It’s an apt term. Describes the twinkling of a too-bright mind. He’s never predicted a death or given John the lottery numbers. It’s always been little things like mentioning Bobby three minutes before the phone rings. 

Or this, with the eyes.   
  
What is John supposed to do with this information? It’s not like he can round up all the blue-eyed people in town and torture the truth out of them.  
  
What he’s going to have to do is hike back down to the highway, hitch a ride back and start canvassing the places Dean would have frequented. The school. Did he ever get enrolled? Usually, when John has them in a place for more than a week, Dean will get himself and Sam registered in school. John has been so preoccupied with Adam’s illness and hunting he hadn’t even confirmed.   
  
He’d seen Sam what looked like homework. Then again, Sam will give himself assignments if he’s out of school too long. He’ll collect books, circle vocabulary he doesn’t know, make up math problems.   
  
Hell, Sam might know where Dean hangs out or who with, but John can’t always look the kid in the eye. When he feels how badly he’s fucking up and it’s evidenced by Sam’s distant, lost expression.   
  
To be sure, John trudges through the snow - knee-high in places - past the school. As expected, it’s closed for the day. Hopefully, they’ll be back in session tomorrow, but he can’t let another day pass without making some headway.   
  
That leaves one option: the absolute last place John wants to show his sorry, busted face. Cops will take one look at his lip and eye and his bruises and assume he’s trouble. They won’t be entirely wrong.   
But John can also speak their language. A lot of law enforcement is former military. They all want the same things: order, predictability, safety. John has respect for the men in blue.  
  
He can only imagine the way they’ll roll their eyes when he waltzes in and admits that he’s lost track of his fifteen-year-old son. Their first reaction is going to be the same as his, “How do you know he’s not with some girl?”  
  
John will be an idiot admitting that he doesn’t know. That’s the problem. Not knowing is unacceptable. Dean can hold his own against most creatures, but he also knows better than to go after one alone. (If he’s learned from what his father says, not what he does). The only way Dean would find himself at the mercy of a vamp or worse would be if the damn thing caught him off guard.   
  
As mortifying as it’ll be to walk into the precinct, these men will know the area. They know the people. If anybody can help John narrow down unusual activity, it’s these guys.   
  
So, he enters the building with his head bowed, shakes off the cold, and approaches the front desk. The female receptionist makes him wait to confer with a deputy in his early twenties. Finally, after digging in his heels and raising his voice, John graduates to waiting outside the sheriff’s office.   
  
It takes forty nerve-wracking minutes before John is allowed to enter the room. He sits across the desk from a uniformed man in his early 60s, with a bushy grey mustache and the bluest damn eyes John has ever seen in his life.   



	9. Chapter 9

The coughing wakes Sam up. He sits up on the couch, follows the distant glow of a night light to an open door. He stands in the frame, staring at the little boy. His “little brother”. 

Kate didn’t say much while she prepared and served them dinner. She sure did cough a lot, though. And she snapped at Adam more than once. She didn’t yell at Sam. She only glanced at him from the corner of her eye, as if afraid to speak directly to him. 

She hacked into her fist while putting sheets onto the sofa. Sam mumbled. “Thank you.”

She nodded and tucked in the little boy. 

Adam begged for a story. Sam could hear his whining all the way in the living room. Kate refused and let him cry himself to sleep. 

Now, standing in the doorway, Sam wonders which book Adam wanted to read. His shelves crammed with board books, mostly. But some big floppy picture books. Sam would prefer chapter books and encyclopedias, but literally, anything is good. He never has enough books. If he could move into a library, he’d be one happy kid. 

But then again, the idea of happy is treason until Dean comes home. 

Sam dreamed about him. And about Bible lore. He can’t recall the details, though. Shouldn’t have gotten up so quickly. 

He takes a deep breath and steps one foot into Adam’s room. 

Adam. 

That’s a name from the bible. The first man  
So is Sam. He was an old testament prophet.   
John was an apostle. 

No Dean in there. 

There’s Kate coughing again. Sam turns toward it. Not sure what he wants in Adam’s room anyway. Has no plan. He lets his feet carry him to Kate’s room. Her door is parted. Maybe so she can hear Adam, or so the kid can sneak in overnight. 

That’s the sort of thing Sam always imagined mothers do. And the way she wiped Adam’s chin at the table and gave him more milk without him having to ask. But then she refused to read his bedtime story. Too early to tell yet whether she’s the good kind of mother. 

Sam steps into Kate’s room and listens to her cough. It’s deep and rough like the sound of big rocks rattling in a hollow trashcan. Not a nice sound. But whether she’s sick or not. Whether she’s a nice mother or not. None of this is Sam’s problem. 

His brother is missing.   
His real brother. 

This Adam kid is cute, but just having the same father doesn’t make someone your sibling. 

Right now, Sam should be out hitchhiking. He never should have let his father go without him. Sam doesn’t know where Dean is, but he’s not in this house. And Dean would never sit idly by and let Sam be missing.

Maybe if Sam wasn’t such a coward, he’d have left the cabin on the morning when Dean didn’t come back. Before the snow hit. Before the world got impossible. Instead, all Sam did was call Bobby and sit around waiting and begging the walls for Dean to come back. 

When the door to the cabin opened, Sam had hoped it would be Dean. But it wasn’t. It was his dad, all busted up from a hunt. Wasting another night. Four nights now. Five days. And Sam is doing less than nothing. 

But if he goes out there, what’s to prevent him from winding up missing, too? Then, their dad will have to find both of them. The only real choice is to sit tight and trust that their father has it all under control. 

Even if Sam doesn’t always like his father. Even if right now, with all this Adam and Kate crap, Sam kind of hates his father, if there’s one thing John Winchester knows how to do, it’s hunt.

Kate rumbles off another awful cough and moans in her sleep. Sam wanders into the kitchen to boil some water for tea, just like Dean would do if Sam was sick. 


	10. Chapter 10

TWO WEEKS AGO 

The shock of being caught shoplifting was so intense and sudden that Dean didn’t even resist the pudgy, balding, middle-aged man who dragged him by his elbow and shoved him into a utility room. The door slammed and the deadbolt clicked shut before he had time to take full inventory of where he was. 

“No. Hey. No way, man.” 

Dean twisted the knob, rammed his shoulder against the door, and shouted until his right side and his throat were red and sore. 

“What the fuck?”

In addition to a folding table with stackable steel chairs on either side, the 15 x 20 space served as a closet of sorts. No windows. Dean couldn’t even locate a vent. He excavated the pack of hotdogs from his pants and tossed them on the table.

There were boxes of unsold or unsellable items. Expired canned goods. On the off chance these assholes planned to leave him in this room to rot, at least there were be food. Of course, there was the issue of opening the cans without an opener. But Dean had no intention of staying that long.

Of course, he had no bobby pin and no credit card to bust the lock. On third glance around the room, he noticed a phone hanging on the wall. 

Sure. He could have called his dad. More accurately, he could have called Bobby who would have located the nearest hunter to get Dean out of this. Then, Bobby would be obligated to tell Dean’s dad, whenever he came back. The old man would fucking skin him. 

On the other hand, John Winchester wasn’t going to be pleased if his oldest boy got himself cuffed, fingerprinted, and locked up for shoplifting lo-rent wieners. In his haste, Dean had been an ass and grabbed the store brand. He wasn’t even getting busted for the good stuff. 

“FUCK!”

The first thing he hurled was his packet of dogs. They combusted against the dingy white cinder block wall with a satisfyingly sickening wet sound. After that, Dean went for cans. Some he lobbed at the door. Others at the walls. None of them burst, but the more he threw the better he felt.

By the time he’d thrown every can, demolished every box, and overturned the table, he was winded enough to lean against the far wall and slide to the floor, panting. If he hadn’t emptied his lighter the previous day, he’d have heaped the cardboard in the center of the floor and set a fire. 

Probably best that didn’t work out since he had no way of knowing how long this day manager asshole planned to keep him locked in this room. The last thing Dean wanted to do was die from smoke inhalation in some goddamn discount food mart in some nowhere town. 


	11. Chapter 11

The sheriff is not available. The sheriff’s deputy is useless. While John is filling out a missing person’s report, the young idiot makes an off-color comment about how Dean is probably shacked up with some girl, hiding from the storm, fucking his brains out. He doesn’t use those words exactly, John curls his fists at the suggestion - even though he’d had the same damn though himself. 

He’s not here to start a fight with a moron cop. He’s here to find his son. After that magnificent waste of time and energy, there’s nothing else to do but hike through the muddy sludge back to the cabin, on the off chance that Dean is waiting there. Of course, John will be obliged to kick his ass for the upheaval, but when he’s done, he’ll probably even hug the kid.   
When’s the last time he did that? Just hugged either one of them.

John has been carrying Adam for the last few weeks, rocking him while they waited for the children’s Tylenol to kick in. 

If Sam gets hugged, that’s Dean’s department. And Dean looks too much like Mary for hugging. Nothing weird. It’s not like that. John doesn’t want to fuck his kid. Every now and again, he has a fantasy about killing them both. Ending it. Finding out whether the bullshit about Heaven is true. Considering John’s luck, Mary is there waiting for him and he’ll never get past the pearled gates. 

All John has the presence of mind for is training Mary’s boys. Making them strong. Making it so John never has to walk into a room and see his beautiful son on a roof, all backlit with flames.

John shakes away the sickening thought, spits a loud loogie onto the gravel road, and pulls his jacket tighter around his bruised ribs. When the deputy inquired about John’s busted, purpling face, he’d lied about a rough bar night. John kicks slush from the steps and tromps onto the cabin’s porch. 

Please, God. Just let him be here.   
  
After that, the headache of introducing Dean to Kate and Adam, but Dean created this goddamn emergency. And John’s been meaning to pull the families together since the baby was born anyway, even if just for an afternoon cookout.

Deep breath. Turn the key. Enter the darkness. Silence.

Let out a heavy breath and let the lead sink deeper into his belly.

“Where the fuck are you, boy?”


	12. Chapter 12

Dean coughs and winces. Whimpers. And squints through the pitch darkness.   
He’s done calling out. That shit hurts even worse than breathing.   
From up here, on his cross, the best thing he can do is sip tiny bits of air, keep his eyes squeezed shut and pray this ends soon, one way or another.


	13. Chapter 13

Kate slept a few fitful hours. Sam spent the entire night in the corner on the floor of her bedroom waiting for her to sputter, cough, and breathe her last. (Because that’s what mothers do. They die.)

While she coughed, her little son lay in the bed beside her, whimpering and whispering her name. 

Not her name. 

“Mommy?”

Every time Adam said it, she’d moan and shiver. 

Would Sam’s dad think he’d killed her? 

He’s not like that. He wouldn’t do something like that. He doesn’t even like the idea of killing monsters. Sam wouldn’t hurt someone’s mother. It sucks not having a mother. Where other kids have mothers, Sam has Dean.

Had   
Maybe he left because Dean is annoying or needy.

When he was four years old, Sam would have happily traded his dad a mom. Even one of those yelling, impatient moms he sometimes sees at the store. Not Dean, though. Sam wouldn’t trade every mother in the world for Dean. 

But now, he’s here with Adam and Kate.

Sam did his best. He made the tea. He asked if she needed anything else. Kate just shook her head. What else can he do besides hug his knees and wish Dean would come to get him?

He closes his eyes and tries to feel his brother like he sometimes can. All Sam feels is an awful sharp pain in his chest and his belly. Like hot spikes. Worse than anything he’s ever felt. He stops trying. 

What if Sam’s dad finds Dean in some monster’s lair and they both get killed. And Kate dies. And Sam has nobody left in the world except Adam. Which means Sam has to take care of himself and this kid. He shudders.

If it wasn’t the middle of the night, he’d call Bobby. Bobby will take care of them. Sam will take Adam, hitch a ride to Sioux Falls and live in a junkyard for the rest of his life. That wouldn’t be the worst thing. He’d trade his dad for Bobby. 

By the time the sun comes up, Sam’s back hurts, his eyes are puffy from holding back tears. His nose stings. 

Kate is snoring with her mouth open. Adam sits up in bed, tries to shake his mother, but hardly budges her body. Then, he looks at Sam and says, “I’m hungry.”


	14. Chapter 14

TWO WEEKS AGO 

Just when Jimmy thought it was impossible to hate his job more, the fucking weasel store manager called him off his lunch break to come deal with some shoplifting punk. Once again, Jimmy would have to fill out paperwork about what the little shit had tried to steal, name, address, all that crap. If the kid was a repeat offender, Jimmy would have to call it in to the precinct. The last fucking thing on earth he wanted to do.

In two years of working security at Belle View plaza, he’d never opened the door and found the manager’s office ransacked. 

Jimmy stood in the door frame and scanned the room with his mouth wide open. Then he sighted the culprit and stopped breathing.   
  
The boy was sixteen, maybe. Golden hair hanging over light eyes. Hard to tell the exact color from across the room. Golden skin in the dead of winter. Cheeks flushed, probably from the exertion of tearing the room apart. Lips raspberry pink.  
  
“Why don’t you take a picture, you perv?”  
  
Jimmy snapped out of his reverie and waved an arm at the mess. “What the fuck?”   
  
The kid leaped to his feet like a panther and tried to bolt. If Jimmy was one of these donut-eating fatfucks down at the precinct, he never would have had the reflexes to throw out an arm and stop the boy in his tracks. But he was five years older, thirty pounds heavier and worked out daily.   
  
He shoved the kid onto his ass and slammed the door shut behind him.  
  
“Listen, you little —”  
  
The boy bounced back onto his feet and swung. Not wild and hapless. Like he’d been taught how to hurt somebody. Jimmy took one of those blows, hopped back, and let the pain seep from his jaw through his skull.

Jimmy had done some combat training and he’d probably win this battle, but it wouldn’t be a free pass. He ripped the taser from the holster. The next time the boy lunged, Dale thumbed off the safety and jabbed him in the sternum.   
  
It was only the second time, he’d used the thing. The first time was on himself, by accident. So, he knew, first hand, the tooth-chattering, bone-burning agony that accompanied the electric seizure. The kid’s mouth flapped open and shut, shrieks choked out. The left leg of his jeans darkened and a wet spot spread as he wet himself. 

Jimmy watched, enraptured by the sight of an angel being tortured.  
  
The rush struck him like a cargo train. When was the last time he was so hard so fast? 

When the kid stopped shaking and curled up like a groaning fetus, Jimmy followed the training and checked his pulse. Racing and weak. If he tazed this skinny asshole again, the boy’s heart would probably stop. Jimmy could call it self-defense.

Take a picture, perv. 

Jimmy opened his fly, pulled out his engorged dick, and began to jerk off. His face contorted as disgust and confusion raged through his system on a boiling wave of lust.

He’d never done anything remotely like this. Had never been tempted to. He’d roughed up a few punks and imagined bashing a few skulls open, but not this. If anybody came in now, he’d lose this damn job (at best). If Jimmy didn’t do blow his load all over this kid’s face, he’d spend the rest of his life fantasizing.   
  
Drool oozed down the wild angel’s chin. He convulsed sharply and stilled again. Jimmy kneeled to prop the kid against the side of the desk. Sliding his dick into the kid’s slack mouth, he came apart within seconds. 

Then, he sat back on his haunches, watching his jizz dribble down the lip and jaw of the prettiest boy he’d ever seen. 


	15. Chapter 15

The following day, with school back in session, John is the weird old guy trying to look casual while harassing teenagers sloshing through the icy muck on their way to class. After five minutes of frustration, a pretty girl with dark hair in a ponytail rolls her eyes

“Dean is a complete goof-off, when he even comes to school.” 

“Yeah, but he’s so hot,” another girl says and giggles as she stalks past.

The helpful girl hugs her books and lists six girls who might know Dean’s whereabouts. John might have been outraged by this report of his son’s behavior if it didn’t sound so much like himself at that age. 

The Marines had straightened him out. Not that John was a bad kid, but he was more than his parents could have tamed. Chain-smoking, foul-mouthed pussy magnet. The military starched him into the upstanding family man worthy of Mary Campbell.

Maybe his life would have been better if he’d never married.

Sure, Dean behaved when John was around, but how much was that? John had never been to a parent/teacher conference. For all practical purposes, Dean was raising Sam. If John is honest, Dean’s raising himself, too. The boy got four good years with two parents. Then, his whole life fell to shit. 

John pinches the bridge of his nose. He can’t very well enter the high school and track down those girls. So, he hauls his sorry, still-aching ass over to the nearest phonebooth to find addresses in the yellow pages. 

Potential girlfriends:

Susie Harris.   
There are 16 Harris families in this town and no way to know which of those has a teenaged daughter named Susan or Suzanne or Susanah. Once John does locate the right family, how to explain why he wants a private conversation with their little girl? 

Tracking down Dean is becoming every bit as nerve-wracking as a hunt. John is going to brain that boy when he finds him. 

Marlene Watkins.  
Jenny Paige  
Jen Jernigan   
Melissa Berman  
June Wannamaker

When John finally tracks down and question every girl, none of them have seen Dean in days. 


	16. Chapter 16

TWO WEEKS AGO

Dean didn’t regain consciousness because he never passed out. 

Slowly, gradually, the paralysis lessened. Even then, he lay for twenty minutes - a heap of overstimulated limbs in urine-soaked, too-tight jeans that the girls loved and he hated. His two-sizes-too-small clothes weren’t a fashion statement. He didn’t shoplift to be a badass. 

Yes, he was a badass. Dean Winchester, despite the stranger’s semen drying on his chin and caked into the fabric of his Ramone’s t-shirt, was a badass. He could have kicked that guy’s ass to kingdom come if he hadn’t had the taser. Dean could have murdered that guy with his bare hands.

But the fact is, he didn’t. He failed to defend himself and had been face-raped for it. 

Dean lay on the floor an additional ten minutes before taking a deep breath as if standing was a deep dive into cold manure. He dragged his pitiful, exhausted body back to the cabin and fussed at Sam for no good reason. Then he sent his brother to bed with a belly of coffee and stale oyster crackers. 

Luckily, Dean had pilfered a whole mess of those at a diner a few months ago. There’s no way Sam was full, but he wouldn’t starve. 

Dean lay in the other single bed. In the dark. Eyes wide open while his stomach griped loudly and his brain went off the rails.

It wouldn’t be the first time he’d beaten off with Sam a few feet away. 

His little brother either hadn’t started masturbating yet or he was a stealthy little fuck. Either way, Dean never heard so much as a grunt out of Sam. 

Dean, however, is loud. He needs to relieve himself often and he doesn’t hold back. There’s no way his little brother hadn’t heard. If Sam had an opinion, he kept it to himself. 

The problem that night was that Dean didn’t want to jerk off to the shit he was thinking about.

Getting tased didn’t classify as pain. His father’s punches were pain. Getting body slammed is pain. Being tased is more being liquified.

Then, there was the sensation of being dragged to the wall, propped up like an inanimate object.

And let’s not forget the fucking dick in his mouth. The weight, the scent, the taste of a dick on his tongue. Dean had lacked the muscle control to even close his lips around it, but it was there. Heavy. Salty. Musky. The tang of spunk still lingered, after Dean brushed his teeth for ten minutes and showered for another thirty. 

“Shit.”

Dean whispered into the night and squeezed his eyes shut before sliding his hands down past the elastic of his shorts. 


	17. Chapter 17

They were Dean’s tightest jeans, which wasn’t saying much. He owned three pairs of thrift store jeans, five rock band t-shirts, and a few oversized flannels inherited from his dad. 

Faded AC/DC logo on his black t-shirt, short sleeves rolled up to the shoulder, denim squeezing his ass - he leaned against the brick post outside of the grocery store and lit a Lucky Strike. 

It was damn dumb to loiter around this place. If the wrong person recognized him, they’d call the real cops on his truant ass. Maybe TaserPrick wasn’t even on duty today.

Dean took a long drag off his smoke and kicked the heel of his scuffed-up boots onto the post behind him. 

Fucking dumb. 

If he did see the guy, then what? Maybe TaserPrick didn’t even find him attractive. That could be how the dude dealt with every kid who came into the place with sticky fingers. Cold, hard punishment. Nothing more.   
Fine. Dean Winchester had no problem breaking rules if that’s what it took to get a job done. 

Fucking idiot. 

The guy wasn’t even there. Dean was cutting school, hanging around outside of the grocery store he tried to plunder, looking for some guy with a taser - for what?

He took another drag and then nearly choked on the smoke as the TaserPrick stepped out of the Rite Aid and froze. He stared right at Dean, then turned and stalked off in the opposite direction. 

Suspicion confirmed: Dean Winchester is a fucking loser. 

He tossed his cigarette on the ground, crushed it under his boot on his way down the street, away from that stupid fucking plaza and that asshole who had absolutely no interest in him. He was ready to vomit with the heavy thickness of it in his gut. 

The guy didn’t want him. Why the hell should some adult man want a scrawny teenage punk? Worse? Why the fuck should Dean want some piece of shit hick? He wasn’t gay. Never, in his life had he looked at a guy and thought, “Yeah, I’d love to hit that.”

Not once. 

This guy wasn’t hard on the eyes, but Dean didn’t want him.   
He wanted that feeling. 

His mind was clear enough to admit that to himself. Fuck that guy. Dean could burn a hole into his arm with the butt of smoke and maybe get the same sensation. 

Except, besides the pain, there was also the mortification of being abused. The powerlessness. That fucker could have done anything to him and there wouldn’t have been shit Dean could have done about it. 

God. Why is that so fucking hot?   
Dean was hard again thinking about it. 

Tires scraped over gravel behind him. Dean’s senses on high alert as the passenger mirror of a spotless white, Ford pickup truck was at his shoulder. 

TaserPrick sat behind the wheel, staring up the street. Not bothering to look at Dean or say anything. 

Dean’s heart beats in his ears. He could keep walking, play difficult. Make the fucker beg. Better yet, he could get over this weird obsession on his own. If he beat off to the memory much more, he’d take a layer of skin off his dick. 

“Just fucking get in, you little shit.” 


	18. Chapter 18

There might be other leads, but John’s not finding them. He has turned over every stone. Returned to the cabin, questioned every girl, filled out that missing person report. He questioned the English teacher Dean was reportedly banging in exchange for a passing grade. 

John didn’t buy her denials, but he does believe that the bitch doesn’t know where Dean is right now. 

John could go back and ask if Sam has any more psychic hits or whatever weird shit, but he doesn’t encourage that crap. John and Bobby have gone back and forth about that for years. Do Sam’s little premonitions have something to do with yellow-eyes? Is that why the kid is so damned bright?  
If that’s what it is, John will have to dispatch Mary’s younger son. That’s going to break this man in ways he can’t entertain now.

Can’t go back to Sam empty-handed. 

John has just enough energy to sit on the ice-cold curb with face in his hands and refuse to cry. The self-pity only lasts half a minute before he stands and hunts down the nearest liquor store. 


	19. Chapter 19

TaserPrick’s pick up truck halted under the shadow of naked trees in a thick, ancient forest. How many people even knew about this one-lane, unmarked road? In the distance, there was a cabin. Way bigger and more upscale than the hovel the Winchesters were staying in. A clear lake beyond that. A real nice getaway.

Except Dean was pretty sure that’s not what TaserPrick had in mind. 

As far as he knew, this asshole was planning to murder him, chop him into a dozen pieces, and rid the world of one more shoplifter. 

If the guy didn’t have the taser, Dean could defend himself. He could probably hold his own anyway, now that he knows about it. The whole thing had caught him off guard last time. 

But did he wanted to defend himself? Did he want to get tased again? Did he want to suck this guy’s cock?

Dean honestly had no idea what he wanted or why he was sitting in the woods in some stranger’s pickup truck. He tapped his right toes inside of his too-tight boots, elbow hanging out of the open window - into the crisp, late fall air. Breathing normal took a conscious effort, especially after the driver jumped out of the truck, leaving his door open. 

Dean curled his fists and willed himself not to run. It required even more willpower not to resist when his door flew open and the guy yanked him onto the cold, hard ground. 

He couldn’t stop himself from scrambling to his knees, but then the reality of the moment kicked in. Like in those quiet moments before a storm, something was going to happen. The taser was hanging from the dude’s belt, along with a billy club. This could get real fucked up, real quick. 

Rather than fight, Dean went slack and let the guy shove his skull against the side of the truck. 

“What do you want?”

Head swirling, lungs aching, dick stiffening, Dean shook his head. No answer. 

Guys had stared at him before. Some have said messed up things about his mouth, but he never took that shit seriously. If he had, it would have turned into a fight. 

“You were looking for me, right?”

Dean didn’t want to be looking for the guy. He just couldn’t stop thinking about it. This was the only way he was going to be able to put it out of his head. 

He should be disgusted by the whole idea, but it makes him so fucking hot he was going to explode if he didn’t do something. Maybe if he just blew this guy again, his brain would go back to normal horny and not this 24-hour loop of that incident in the manager’s office. 

“What the fuck do you want?”

“I just want …” Dean braces himself to say it: “to suck your cock.” 

As the words spilled out, it was also a lie. Or at least not the whole truth.

“Fucking faggot.”

He wasn’t gay. It was just… 

The backhand slap was nowhere near as hard as John would beat him if Dean’s dad had any idea where he was and what he was doing. Letting this know-nothing civilian slap him like a bitch. Dean grabbing his damp crotch and whimpering for the asshole to hit him harder. 

“Shit.”

That wasn’t a slap. It was a fucking punch and not a sissy one either. It split Dean’s lip. The pain sent the blood directly to his leaking dick. 

Head reeling, Dean blocked the next blow and caught the one after that. The guy stared down at him and stepped back. A look flashed over his face. They both knew that Dean was volunteering for this. That Dean could kick his ass six ways to Sunday if he wanted to. 

“Not the face,” Dean said. 

Not because he was vain - which, of course, he was. He was a head-turningly gorgeous 15-year-old boy. Of course, he was stuck-up, but also…

“If my dad finds out about this…”

The guy pursed his lips and nodded, almost as if they were old pals exchanging stories about their old mens’ bullshit. Then he kicked Dean in the ribs. Whatever air was in Dean’s ribs whooshed out and he toppled forward, choking and gasping for breath. 

The guy grabbed him by the shirt, dragged him to the end of the truck, and dropped the tailgate. He slammed Dean face down onto the cruel, frosty metal. Then, he started tugging on Dean’s pants. 

“Wait a minute…”

The guy didn’t wait though. He jostled Dean’s legs wide, Tugged at his own belt - Dean could hear it jingling in his ringing ears. The mother fucker shoved Dean’s t-shirt up to his nipples and spat on the base of his back. 

“Wait …”

Dean leaned up on his elbows. Tried to catch his breath, and tried to get the guy off him. Kind of. He squirmed a little and bucked once or twice. But he didn’t engage any kind of actual maneuver that would have put the asshole on his back. 

It was more of a token struggle - so he could say he didn’t just let the guy shove a spit-covered finger into his asshole. The thing is, it hurt. It more than hurt. It was like someone shoving a lit cigar up his poop chute. 

But it also brought on a high like he’d never felt. A rush of endorphins or adrenaline or some hormone shooting through his veins. Dean cried out half in agony and half blissed out of his mind. 

His spine damn near snapped in half as he pushed up, arching back and howling when the dick split him open.   
Then, a revelation: this was what he wanted: to be treated like garbage, tortured and reduced to a useless, slobbering pulp again. 


	20. Chapter 20

Getting fucked is not like fucking. 

No afterglow for young Dean Winchester. The high of the whole episode soured as soon as the guy pulled out. Almost as if he’d deflated Dean’s soul in the process, leaving him washed up like a used rubber.

The belt clinked as the guy pulled his pants together. He gave Dean’s ass a hard smack. A few seconds later, the truck door slammed.

Dean lay with his face and his belly on the icy steel, his battered ass exposed to the frosty air. Muttering profanity, wishing the dude would come back and taze him to death. Or stab him in the throat or shoot him or run over him with this truck and back up and make sure the job was done right. 

Once the high had passed, Dean felt nothing but shitty. Not shitty. Shit. He was a horse-trampled pile of shit. 

After a few minutes, the guy honked his horn. Dean took a breath and carefully pawed at his raw and slimy hole. 

“Shit.”

At least it went quickly. The air foul with the stink of jizz and ass. Dean needed to get home and shower before Sam sniffed him out. The kid didn’t know shit about sex, but he’d know something was up. 

Dean righted his pants, shut the tailgate and drew in a ragged breath. Maybe if he wasted a few more minutes, the guy would drive off and leave him alone - with no idea how to get back to town. 

“Fuck.”

Slowly, he dragged himself back to the passenger’s door, hauled his sore behind in and stared out of the passenger window, chewing a hole into his bottom lip. 

Still, the truck didn’t budge. Instead, the driver reached for the glove compartment. Dean tensed, but didn’t flee. 

That’s where his dad kept his pistol.   
If the guy shot him, it would be a mercy. 

He’d better hid the body well, though, because John Winchester would never stop hunting - on principle, not because he gives a shit about Dean.

That wasn’t fair, and Dean knew it. It wasn’t that his dad didn’t care. He was just… Everything was shit.

Dean dropped his face in his hand and bunched every muscle in his body in an attempt not to cry.   
It was never going to work. 

Dean didn’t even see what the guy pulled from the glove compartment. He was too busy cursing himself out and wishing he could die of humiliation.

“Come on,” the guy said. “Cut it out.”

Dean shook his head, turned his back to the asshole and let out a bone-rattling, noisy, snotty-ass sob. His hand fell on the doorknob just as a hand fell on his shoulder. Dean went rigid. Then the hand started to rub, cautiously at first. 

“Listen…”

Dean shook his head and tried to shake the guy off. Next thing he knew, the dude was hugging him. Holding him, really. Arms wrapped all the way around him, rocking while Dean dampened his shirt. It was nowhere near as good as the high, but it was oddly good. Dean made the same cursory attempt at getting away, hoping the guy wouldn’t buy it. 

By the time Dean finally pulled himself together, the guy pulled a matching pair of twenties from his wallet.

“What’s your name?”

Dean looked at the cash. If he so much as touched it, he’d be a whore. Without it, he was a fuckhole. 

The guy put the money on the dashboard and started the engine. 

“Well, my name is Jimmy Novak.” He shifted it into gear. “And my daddy’s an asshole, too.”

Dean snatched up the money before Jimmy Novak put the truck into drive.

So what? Dean Winchester was a whore. There were plenty of kids in school who called him that already, just because he liked to fuck. 

Dean lifted his hips to jam the bill into his pocket. The motion made his ass hurt even worse. He needed that shower like he needed air. Couldn’t wait to be dropped off some place, put this day behind him, and never see this dude again. 

The truck stopped. The guy looked at him and waited.

For a moment, Dean pursed his lips together. Then, he spilled: “Dean.”

“Was that difficult?”

“Whatever, man.”

Jimmy chuckled and put the truck back into gear. “Nice to meet you, Dean.”


	21. Chapter 21

12 DAYS AGO

Gloria Dunham was half-Italian and fucking gorgeous with wavy black hair to halfway down her back and tits the size of cantaloupes and legs and a mouth that wouldn’t quit. She sucked like a porn star which helped Dean remember who the fuck he was - with his hands on her head while she moaned around his meat.

How he could love that as well as enjoy the full-on brutality Dale could unleash, he didn’t know, but Dan wasn’t doing much self-analysis while Gloria was on her knees. 

She’d swallows his spunk, sit back and light one of his cigarettes and start cursing out everyone from her older sister to her mother fucking history teacher. It wasn’t love, but Dean never stopped smiling when she was around. 

Then, as long as John wasn’t in town, he’d lay back in Gloria’s bed with her head on his arm. Sometimes, after a particularly savage session, Dale would lift Dean from the floor and drag him into bed. Dean would still be shaking and too fucked up - dizzy or in pain - to speak or argue. 

He didn’t want the guy kissing and patting him. Dean was not gay. He wasn’t homophobic either. He was fine with letting Dale fuck him in exchange for money and food and a severe ass-whipping. It was more than fair. 

“My turn” Gloria whispered. 

Dean’s lip and the inside of his cheek still hurt like hell from Jimmy’s punch.  
But fair’s fair and eating pussy would make him feel a little more like a man. 

Dean did his job, and looked up with the scent of this girl dripping all over him. (And his face screaming in pain). He gave it another ten minutes before he got into his clothes so he could get back to Sam.


	22. Chapter 22

10 DAYS AGO

For the first time, Dean had money to go to the grocery store and buy decent shit. Marshmallow cereals for himself. Vegetables for Sam.  
But he went across town to do it. Never shopped at the plaza where Jimmy worked. 

Instead, when he and Jimmy hooked up, they did it at the cabin.  
And it was fucking nice in there. Two stories, clean, soft furniture. Always something good in the fridge. Shit Dean liked: burgers, bacon, beer. And Jimmy never said no. Let Dean eat as much as he wanted. For the first time in his life, he ate without worrying whether there would be enough for Sammy. 

Jimmy would sit in his underwear at the kitchen table, watching while naked Dean used the spatula to press fat burgers down into the lard. 

“You sure you don’t want one?”

Jimmy shook his head, smiling. He’d earned the smug look on his face after he’d buttfucked Dean with nothing but spit. At the same time, he choked Dean to the brink of passing out and punched him in the liver until Dean was screaming out in agony and euphoria. A crazy cocktail of sensations and emotions Dean couldn’t understand.

When it was over, his high plummeted until he was laying on his stomach, sobbing into the pillow like a pitiful bitch. Jimmy laid beside him, massaged his back, and repeated, “It’s all right. Cry it out, kid.”

There would be more bruises to add to the ones on his back and guts. He had some on his arms and legs from the previous time when Jimmy beat him with a belt buckle. Some from the time before that when Jimmy tossed him around the place. Dean’s asshole never seemed totally right anymore. 

But he was well-fed and there was cash in his pocket.

“You never told me,” Dean says while chewing. “Is this your place or what?”

“No way. Belongs to my folks. The old man, really. He lets the rest of us come out here.” Jimmy chuckled bitterly and picked at his fingernails with the tip of a knife.

He’d tried to do some weird slicing shit, but Dean wasn’t sure he’d ever be ready for that. 

“So, you don’t get along with your dad?” Dean asked, massaging his tender ribs.

“My dad is an asshole. Sounds like you know a little about that.”

Dean shrugged. He could tell Jimmy all about how John leaves him alone with Sam. How he makes them fight him and each other and monsters. But it’s not really this guy’s business. 

“You know what kind of asshole my old man is,” Jimmy asked. “Senior year of high school, I knocked up my girlfriend. You know what that asshole did?”

“You had a girlfriend?”  
The twinge of jealousy surprises Dean, but he brushes it aside with another bite of his hamburger. 

“Hell yeah,” Jimmy laughed. “I played ball… Could have had any girl I wanted.”

Dean nodded. That was no surprise. Jimmy was damn good looking and strong with thick black hair like his dad. 

“Would have been more conspicuous not to have a girl,” Jimmy said. “I picked a nice church girl because I thought she'd be able to keep her legs closed. Ha.”

Depends on the church girl. Some of them are sincerely sweet and innocent, but some of them are the biggest sluts you’ll ever meet. It only takes about 60 seconds to tell which kind you’re dealing with.

“If I hadn’t fucked her, she would have told all her little squealing friends.” Jimmy put down the knife and grabbed a caramelized onion from Dean’s plate. “Do you know what happens when you fuck girls, Dean? They get knocked up.”

Hasn’t happened to Dean - thank Fuck - or at least not as far as he knows. They’d never stuck around anywhere long enough for him to find out if he’d knocked up some girl. That would be the craziest shit ever. 

“So, what’d your dad do?” Dean asked. 

“Same thing he always did. He beat the shit out of me?”

Dean chuckled. “Yeah. That sounds like my dad.”

Jimmy shrugged and lit up a cigarette. 

A beating would look like a cuddle next to what John Winchester would do to Dean if he knew about this. 

What exactly was this?

Dean was eating well, taking care of his little brother, in exchange for a little sex. And he was getting the shit kicked out of him at the same time. He couldn’t understand why, but it made him hot as shit. So, Dean Winchester and Jimmy Novak had an understanding. It was maybe a little fucked up, but whatever. 

Dean took another bite of his burger and nodded while Jimmy told him how humiliated he was when he couldn’t pass the test to get onto the police force. 


	23. Chapter 23

John lays with his belly to the sky like a fish that has swum its last. Only John’s in no bowl. He’s on a huge pile of snow, slush, ice, and dog shit in a public park. 

The empty bottle of Jack has already slipped from his numb right hand and slid down to the ground. A raging hot glob of acid reflux burns its way from his stomach up his esophagus. John could try to sit up, but his brain and his muscles aren’t exactly communicating through the alcoholic fog at the moment. The best he can do is roll on his side and let the gunk spill from his mouth like an invalid.  
That act alone puts the world all out of tilt. If he could will himself to freeze to death, there’d be a statue of miserable, child losing sack of shit for the good people of Winslow.

John pulls the drawing Sam made from his pocket and stares into Dean's sketched eyes. 

"Where the fuck are you?"


	24. Chapter 24

Dean’s eyes were pure emerald and gleaming glassy with tears that hadn’t yet fallen down his cheeks. So beautiful Jimmy would never have found words to describe him. 

It had taken two weeks of playing almost every day to finally convince him to try this. The last thing Jimmy wants to do is mess this up.  
He’d disinfected the blade on his multi-tool with fire from the stove. Dean watched silent, with his incredible eyes wide, as Jimmy carved a 1-inch long gash in his forearm. 

“Oh, fuck.”

Dean shook his head and blew out a loud exhale, but he didn’t pull away or cry out. The level of pain this kid could take was remarkable. 

That scar would heal but would never go away. It would heal and fade, but it would be part of Dean’s body forever.

Jimmy would do anything to keep this. A few nights earlier, he dreamed that he bludgeoned Amelia and the baby. Woke with his pulse pounding in his ears but nowhere near remorseful. 

It wasn’t even an option.  
His father would hunt him down and bury him.

While Dean went on gawking at the wound, Jimmy zipped open his fly and shoved his hard dick into the kid’s mouth. Dean gagged, but quickly recovered, craning for more. 

The will to damage him for being so perfect made Jimmy dig into the cut and then smear the blood all over Dean’s face. Then, he stuffed his bloody fingers into the boy’s mouth and fucked him with his hand and his cock. 

Dean whimpered, but remained in his chair, squeezing his crotch and taking it like the best bitch heaven ever created. 

A few moments after Jimmy added his cum to the blend, Dean swallowed it all. Then, he started to cry.  
He always cried. A sweet, broken, baby angel.

Jimmy knelt beside him and tried to wrap his arms around him. Dean shoved him away, but Jimmy didn’t let up until he was holding his boy, whispering nonsense in his ear about how it would be okay.

“He doesn’t care.”

Dean didn’t usually say much. Jimmy kept silent giving him space to let it out. 

“He doesn’t give a fuck whether I live or die. All he wants me for its to hunt … shit.”

The details didn’t make sense, but if there was one thing Jimmy could relate to it was a messed up relationship with his dad. 

When Dean regained his composure, Jimmy walked out of the room and gave him a few minutes to rest, reset and pretend the whole thing never happened. 

Jimmy washed the dishes while Dean showered.  
In the truck on the way back to town, he pulled Dean’s hand to his crotch - already hard again. The kid was a walking aphrodisiac. 

“Dude,” Dean shouted, pointing at oncoming traffic Jimmy had overlooked in his haste to open his pants. “Maybe you ought to —“

“Fucking do it.”

In the few seconds of hesitation, Jimmy swerved hard eliciting a loud honk from the car behind him as it flew past.  
He lunged across the truck’s cabin, grabbing Dean around his throat and slamming his skull against the passenger window. Jimmy wasn’t fooling himself. Even though he was five years older, he’d already seen that Dean was the better-trained warrior. But another thing he’d learned quickly was that the boy responded to clear authority. As long as Jimmy was precise about his demands, he’d maintain the upper hand. 

“If I tell you to do something, you do it. Got it?”

Dean mouthed the word, “Yeah.”

Simply because he was too gorgeous to resist the urge, Jimmy smashed their mouths together. Maybe there would be a time for tenderness between them, but not when Dean was resisting. 

“Okay, man.”

Jimmy finally let him go and Dean got to work. 

“Slow down.”

Dean left-hand jerked him all the way to the front walkway of the house. 

“Where are we?”

“Finish.”

A well-raised pup is so easy to teach new tricks. Dean finished his task, ate Jimmy’s spunk like he was told to, and followed him to the front door. 

Amelia was standing in the living room with the baby on her hip. Jimmy’s mother was tossing a log into the fire. They both looked up when Jimmy entered and then past him at the unannounced guest. He answered the question in their eyes with, “This is Dean. He’s helping me fix the truck.”

Neither of them looked convinced. Not that Jimmy had done anything like this before. There was the incident with the pastor’s son, but everyone had chalked that up to pants down horseplay between a couple of horny teenagers. Then, there was the time with Rick Melvin, but it was hard to tell who knew about that other than Ricky’s poor mother who had caught her darling son with his mouth full of Jimmy’s dick. 

But that was a long time ago. Middle school. 

“Go shake her hand,” he said. 

His sick mind had cooked up the fantasy in the truck. Dean had licked his paw clean, but there would still be traces of Jimmy’s jizz on him. He’d smell like what he just ate. A small smile played on his lip as Dean obeyed his directive. 

He approached Amelia carefully like she might lash out. He offered his hand and she looked at it and then back at Jimmy. 

“Who the hell is this?”

The old man came storming out of his office. 

It was inevitable. It was the price of this little rebellion. Jimmy’s pulse raced, his balls shriveled as he collected the courage to speak. “This is Dean.” 

Jimmy’s father squinted as he looks Dean over. The boy stood perfectly still, let himself be assessed without blinking or cowing. For that alone, Jimmy would worship him for all time. 

The old man shook his head, spun and grabbed Jimmy by the back of his neck - forcing him into the hall like a naughty 10-year-old. They were out of sight, but not earshot of the others, but that never stopped his father.

“What the hell is wrong with you? You don’t bring this shit around your family.”

“He’s helping me with the truck.”

“Like hell he’s helping you…” He stuck a finger in Jimmy’s face. “Get your fucking act together.”

His hands had always been heavy, meaty weapons banging, open-handed against the side of Jimmy’s head as if he’d physically knock some sense into his brain.  
Then, for good measure, the old man punched him in the gut. While Jimmy gasped for air to refill his lungs, his father straightened his shirt and walked away.


	25. Chapter 25

The only problem with being at Kate’s is that Sam can’t go to school. It’s not like she can drive him back and forth to Pullman every day. And she doesn’t have the credentials to enroll him. Of course, Sam could point out that the birth certificate and half the transcripts his dad uses to register him all over the country are forged. 

But he doesn’t say anything. 

He’s been with Kate and Adam for nearly a week. No word from his dad. He called Bobby once, but no news about Dean. 

It’s too scary to think about what that could mean so Sam tries really hard not to. He keeps himself busy reading to Adam and playing with him and tickling him and stuff. He’s really a cute kid. Dean would love him. 

Kate has set up a pile of blankets on the floor in Adam’s room, kind of like Sam is the pet dog, but it’s better than sleeping on the couch like a stranger. 

She kisses Adam’s hair before bed and puts her cool hand on Sam’s forehead. Every night, she calls him an angel (all because he made some tea while she was sick). 

It doesn’t matter why she says it. Sam is hooked. Whenever his father does come back, he’s going to beg to stay with Kate. As long as Dean stays too, Sam will never leave. If Dean doesn’t want to stay, Sam’s going to have a tough decision.


	26. Chapter 26

7 DAYS AGO

The thing about Sam was that you could never lie to him. The moment you tried, he’d see right through it. Dean’s best bet was to sneak into the cabin at a time when Sam’s was nose buried in a book.   
  
He crept in over the salt line at the window and crawled into bed wearing only his shorts.   
  
The next time he woke up, Sam was standing over his bed, slack-jawed and with his brows furrowed. It was a look of utter concern that snapped Dean out of his pain-riddled grogginess. Dean sat bolt upright, wincing from his aching arm. 

“What? What is it?”

He braced himself for bad news about their dad. Dean already had a contingency plan in mind for if John came back battered beyond recognition. Or if John didn’t ever come back. 

“Hey.”  
  
Sam swallowed and went on silently staring. Eventually, Dean followed his glare to the bloodstains on his sheets. They’d bandaged the arm, but it was deeper than it looked, hurt like fuck, and was making a mess.

“Crap.”

“Are you…” Sam’s voice trailed off. 

“I’m fine, buddy.” Dean carefully put his feet on the floor subduing the urge to shout. “See? Fine.”

“What happened?”

“I, uh…”

There was no version of the truth he could tell. Sam wouldn’t understand, because Dean didn’t understand it. Why he was letting this stupid, gay hick treat him like a punching bag, and a twenty dollar whore? Worse, why did Dean like it so frigging much? 

“I’m fine,” he said, hoisting to his feet. 

He moved toward the bathroom swearing under his breath. 

Sam asked. “Were you hunting?” 

“Yeah.” 

The insanity had to end if only so he wouldn’t have to lie to his little brother again. Furthermore, if his dad ever found out, John Winchester would put Dean right out of this misery. 

Then again, how would John ever find out when he didn’t give enough of a shit to check in on them in over a week?

Still, the thing with Jimmy had to end because it had run its course.

Easy. Dean would stay away from Jimmy’s cabin. The guy has a whole freaking family to keep him busy. He won’t even notice Dean isn’t around.


	27. Chapter 27

“All right, buddy.” The sheriff stands wide-legged at the base of John’s ice mountain. 

Ten minutes earlier, John had stood at the peak and watched his steaming piss melt into the side. So, this is how you get an appointment with the top brass in this town. John chuckles to himself.

“I’ve been getting all kinds of troubling reports about you,” the cop says. “You been harassing our girls?”

Questioning, sure. John questioned.  
And this town’s girls had been completely useless. 

No amount of drunk-splaining would clarify that John wasn’t harassing. He was trying to find his fucking son. 

John had been staring at Sam’s drawing like the pitiful sad sack he is. When he got up to piss, it floated away on the breeze. Add littering to his offenses. 

The sheriff bent, picked up the paper, and turned it over. 

As sloshed as John was, the flicker of recognition on the older man’s face was plain as daylight. Just as quickly, the sheriff schooled his expression and said, “The next time I see you, you’re going to spend the night behind bars.” 

It wasn’t until he was lumbering away that it registered with John how blue the man’s eyes were. Blue like the goddamned sky.


	28. Chapter 28

It was easy enough to break up with somebody: just start being an asshole and stop doing the things they expect you to do. At least that was Dean’s past experience with girls. Instead of showing up at their locker after school to carry their bag to the bus, you let them see you laughing with another girl. That easy. 

So, that’s exactly the approach he took with Jimmy. Instead of riding out to Jimmy’s cabin to get fucked and beatdown and abused, Dean showed up at the plaza with his arm draped over Gloria Dunham’s shoulder. He strolled past every store until he found Jimmy lounging around inside the Rite Aid, leaning on the counter chatting with the cashier. 

There’s the message, loud and clear. It’s over, dude. I’m done fagging it up with you. 

Their eyes locked for a split second. Jimmy stood upright. A small smile brightened his face as he told the cashier goodbye. On his way to the door, Dean pressed Gloria against a brick post and gave her a deep, languid kiss. He slid his leg between her thighs and made her melt against him like butter under the summer sun. 

“Wow,” Gloria said as Dean turned to check his handiwork.

Jimmy paused in his tracks, nostrils flaring, jaw clenched. Yeah, sometimes, they get pissed, but they always get the hint. It wasn’t a subtle message.

Dean guided Gloria away with his arm over her shoulder. Mission accomplished. 

He walked her home, fucked her, and strolled back to his own place. There was a snowstorm in the forecast, but not for a few days.

Their dad hadn’t been around in days, but for a split second, Dean mistook the dark chrome through the leaves for the impala. On second glance, he didn’t recognize the late model sedan at all. 

He was a few yards from the cabin when he saw Jimmy on the front porch talking to Sam through the screen door. Embarrassment about the ramshackle shack quickly gave way to simmering rage at Jimmy’s audacity. 

Dean had never invited him to his place, had never shown the guy where he lived, and certainly didn’t give permission to talk to his little brother. 

Dean jogged up the steps and shoved his way between Jimmy and the door. He grumbled over his shoulder, “Close the door, Sammy.”

“He said he knew you.”

“Close the fucking door.”

Dean was growling at his brother, but it wasn’t Sam’s fault. This was the product of Dean’s stupidity and he would deal with it. Sam closed the door and Dean turned up the bravado.

“What are you doing here?”

“Was thinking about you—”

“No, you can’t show up here.”

“Little brother’s almost cute as you.”

Dean’s eyes narrowed. Totally prepared to end this asshole if he so much as spoke Sam’s name in the wrong tone. 

“The fuck do you want, Jimmy? All that shit’s over. Got it?”

“Yeah, I got it.” Jimmy’s voice was calm, his eyes red like he’d been smoking weed or crying. “Thought you might want to make some money.”

He reached out as if to touch Dean’s face and received a shove in return. Jimmy stumbled back but quickly recovered his footing and shook it off with a chuckle. 

“I don’t want shit from you. If my dad was here—”

“I’ll give you two hundred bucks.”

Dean blinked. He hadn’t heard from his dad in over a week. There were twenty bucks left from the last wad Jimmy gave him. 

Over is over.

And with that kind of money, he could feed Sam for a month.

“Go wait in the car.” Dean stuck his head in the cabin and shouted, “I’ll be back in a little.”

Seated on the sofa, Sam looked up from his book. “Who is that guy?

“Nobody. Do your homework?”

“Where are you going?”

“Nowhere. I mean it, get done.”

“Dean.”

Dean shut the door behind him, slicked a hand over his hair. Last time, and for the cash. He skipped down the steps and slid into Jimmy’s passenger’s seat. 


	29. Chapter 29

John Winchester clears out all right. He gets his wobbly ass out of that park and back to his car. He musters up a head-pounding half-sobriety out of sheer force of will and necessity. 

Once the sheriff gets back to his squad car, John puts the impala in gear and trails at an untraceable distance. That look. That glimmer of recognition is the most promising lead he’s had.

It only takes ten minutes for John’s diligence to pay off. The sheriff parks at some risky dink plaza. John lays low across the street and watches the man stalk across the parking lot toward a young security guard. The punch explodes off the older man and knocks the kid off balance.  
Not a child, but a man half John’s age. Closer to Dean’s age. 

The sheriff catches the mall cop in a headlock and drags him around the side of the building. 

Now, John could get involved and help the boy out. But it’s not his business. It is his business to know that the sheriff is messing around with young guys. And it John’s business to wait in his car and follow this piece of shit sheriff until it leads him to Dean.


	30. Chapter 30

6 DAYS AGO

The moment they entered the cabin, a large, strong hand curled around Dean’s neck and tried to pull him gently closer. Before it got that far, he tensed and snaked away from the grip.

“Look,” Jimmy said all softly. “You may not know this, but I love you.”

“No.”

“I’m sorry I ever hurt you. It doesn’t have to be like that between us.”

“No way, Jimmy. Either we fuck or I’m out of here.”

Jimmy tried to pull him into a hug, but Dean shoved him away. The guy laughed it off and leaned in for a kiss. 

“Come on. I want to be with you.”

Dean pushed him again.

“Jimmy. I’m not shitting you.”

Jimmy leaned in and puckered his smile. Dean promptly flattened the man’s lips with a firm punch. Jimmy staggered backward, chuckling like a drunk as he clutched his face.

“Shit, boy.”

When he recovered, he approached again. Acting on sheer instinct, Dean swiftly dodged and elbowed him in the spine. Jimmy went to his knees. Instantly Dean stepped back and raised his hands in surrender. 

Slowly, Jimmy climbed to his knees, clutching his aching back. Dean braced himself for an attack, ready to give in and take his punishment.

Instead, Jimmy let out a loud sigh. “Where the hell’d you learn that?”

“My dad,” Dean said, wincing. “Military.”

“Yeah, mine, too. Never taught me no shit like that.”

Dean shrugged.

“Army?”

“Marines.”

“All right. We’ll fuck,” Jimmy said, massaging his side. But I want you to do something for me first.”

Dean glance at the cabin door and followed his host into the kitchen, through a door down to a cool, damp cellar. Through a utility room to another door where Jimmy took a keychain from his pocket.

The room was full from top to bottom with guns, knives, and swords. It was enough to make John Winchester proud.   
  
“Shit,” Dean whispered in reverence.   
  
Jimmy nodded, stepped back, and let the boy admire and even touch. For his part, Dean stopped being able to resist as soon as he saw the 14th-century katana in its original leather sheath. 

“Is that fucking real?”

“The old man’s a collector.”  
  
Jimmy removed a shuriken from its display hook. Completely on a whim, he took Dean’s hand and turned it palm up. Neither of them spoke as he drew a thin slice down the center.   
  
Dean cursed beneath his breath but didn’t pull away as the line began to blossom red in perfect perpendicular to his lifelines.   
  
Jimmy sliced again deeper, slowly, watching Dean bite his lip. Then, he licked a stripe up the center of Dean’s bloody palm.   
  
“Lose that.”  
  
Dean took off his shirt and then his pants and shorts. If there was one thing he knew how to do it was following orders.   
And suffer.  
  
He stroked himself while Jimmy dragged some lumber from the corner and began arranging it into a large X. 

“What the hell is that?”

“I made it for you,” Jimmy said. 

Then he ushered Dean into position and strapped his wrists to the tops and his legs to the bottom. Once he was fastened, Jimmy stood back and looked him over flashing a dirty smirk at Dean’s hard cock.

“You really are something, you know that?” Jimmy grinned. “Wait right here.”

Good joke. There was no way for Dean to go anywhere. Jimmy disappeared and Dean suffered a brief surge of fear that he’d abandon him.

That quickly gave way as Jimmy returned with a tray. Spread out all over it, he had a bunch of what can only be described as thin ten-inch skewers. 

“What are you going to do with that?”

“You’re the best thing that ever happened to me, you know that?” Jimmy says and then jabs a spike through Dean’s thigh.


	31. Chapter 31

Any man who cares about his son cuffs his ears from time to time. 

It’s come to this. Cleaning up Jim’s messes. This drunk piece of crap grifter is looking for his boy. The pretty boy who Jim had brought to the house a week or so ago. Missing. And according to his fuck-up kid, out at the family cabin. 

Jim had started out as a promising only son. A strong boy with a tendency to knock over other kids and take their toys. When the boy’s mother whined about him acting out in Sunday school, Greg had proudly assured her he’d grow out of it. 

When that damn story spread about Jim and the other kid, it damn near split Greg Novak’s heart into a thousand pieces. But he wasn’t one to bow down to any enemy. 

He’ll beat this damn thing out of his son if it’s the last thing he does. He’ll batter Jimmy’s sorry ass until the sight of another man turns his stomach. If Greg doesn’t beat him, it’ll be somebody else killing his son for being a fag and that’s a loss no father should have to bear. 

Greg smells that something’s not right even before he enters the cabin. It doesn’t smell like sex. It smells like hell. Shit, piss, vomit. 

He opens the door, follows his senses and not his desire to run. He covers his mouth as he descends the stairs to the cellar where the stink is so powerful it clouds the air. What the hell has his son done? It doesn’t smell like death. It smells like something worse.  
Heart pounding, he unlocks and opens the door to the utility room. 

“Holy God.”


	32. Chapter 32

There’s no need to break the door down, or even turn the knob. The sheriff left it swinging open. John enters with his pistol drawn and careful to watch his back for any unexpected ambush. 

Stinks worse than a zoo in here. Like a vamp nest: stale shit and blood. The closer John comes to the odor, the more certain he is that he’d be better off turning around, high tailing it, and never looking back. 

But if there’s any chance that Dean is in this place, or that the sheriff knows where his boy is, then John has no choice but to soldier on. 

He creeps through the dim living room, the brighter kitchen, down the open door to the basement where it smells like the depths of Hell have risen.

“Jesus Christ,” he whispers to no-one, because what does Jesus care. 

When he turns the corner and enters the room where the sheriff is kneeling over a body, John shouts. 

The man looks up. No teeth sprout. He doesn’t hiss. Doesn’t matter. John sinks a bullet between his eyes. Can’t instantly identify what kind of monster he was, doesn’t change the indisputable fact. 

John hovers at the door taking in the full scene:

An X made of untreated wood - St. Andrew’s cross, they’re called. Originally used for executing criminals. More of a kinky sex thing now

Based on the unholy stink in the room, the stains running down the side are blood and piss and shit. There’s a puddle of it on the floor.  
Also on the floor, the sheriff’s body. 

And Dean. 

John covers his mouth. Takes one full second to compose himself before he drops his weapon and goes to his son’s side. 

It seems almost impossible that Dean should still be alive with steel pins sticking out all over his body. Not dainty needles. Not acupuncture. This is fucking psycho. Surgical lances, 7 inches long, 5 millimeters - as many as twenty of them protrude from everywhere on Dean’s body. 

John tugs on one in his leg. It doesn’t budge, but Dean yells. It must have been in so long that the skin has healed around it. Would require surgery to remove. Some of them are almost certainly in or near major arteries and organs. There’s no way John can remove them.

Perhaps most distressing is the one jammed into Dean’s pink and sickly swollen prick. 

“Jesus Christ.”

The only kind of monster John knows would do this sort of thing is a human male. 

“Daddy?”

Dean hasn’t called him that since the fire. The choked off sound of his voice and that single word pierce John to the core.

“Daddy, please?”

Dean must be in so much pain he doesn’t know where he is, or when. All he knows is John is here.  
Does he know that this is John’s fault?  
That John Winchester might as well have driven every one of these nails into his son. 

“Da—“

He can’t even manage to say more on the spare sips of air he’s taking. How did he survive this long?

John drags Dean onto his lap, wraps his arms around him, rocks his yielding body - the way he’d down with Adam when he was sick. “I’ve got you, buddy. Daddy’s here.”

Dean doesn’t call for him again, but John keeps rocking. Keeps murmuring his promises, even after he snaps Dean’s neck. 

For an endless hour, he rocks his first-born son and reminds him, “Daddy’s got you.”

Then, he collects himself, stands, and lifts his boy in his arms. He carries Dean up the stairs, out under the setting sun. Straps Dean into the passenger’s seat with his head lolling sideways at an impossible angle. 

John revs up his engine and drives like the devil. As he’s passing through city limits, snow begins to fall.


End file.
